The Expo

Lucy surveyed the disarray around her, and sighed. The conference room was littered with discarded San Pellegrino bottles, programs, hotel-issued notepads and small paper tasting plates. Chairs were in a state of chaos, with one even toppled over in someone’s haste to make it to the next session. This is not what she had signed up for.

What she had signed up for had been marketed as ‘an opportunity for enthusiastic apprentices to assist industry superstars and make invaluable connections at the country’s premier food and wine expo’. Lucy had begged her Executive Chef for the day off, thinking she might finally get to witness Lucas D’Argent’s famous ‘impossible souffle’ or – shit, imagine! – chance a meeting with Lorna Nix, the femme fatale of fine dining.

All she’d done so far was clean up after paying guests, and settle uncomfortably into the realisation that she’d never be able to afford to stay anywhere as luxurious as the City Plaza Hotel. And to make matters worse, Chef Greg still expected her to show up to work the dinner shift once the day’s presentations had wrapped up. It’d be another 65-hour week, stagnating in the boys’ club at bullshit, miserable apprentice wages.

She was running behind schedule now, after Chester White, the country’s most feared and revered food critic, had chosen to go five minutes overtime, gushing about the nose-to-tail revival. Crouching to retrieve another water bottle, Lucy paused as something caught her eye. Protruding slightly from under the lectern was a small, black notebook. Lucy dropped her weight onto her knees and slid the book towards herself and, without quite knowing why, glanced around the empty room. No one else here.

Lucy regarded the book warily and it stared back at her with a cold, blank contempt. There was something foreboding about it. There was no name on the cover or anything to indicate where it had come from or why it had chosen to impose itself on her day. This couldn’t be good news, really; Lucy just had a gut feeling. Books like this tend to reveal things like your boyfriend’s ex-lovers, or bad debts owed to worse people. They never contain celebrity weight-loss secrets, or discount codes for things you couldn’t otherwise afford. Lucy considered flicking it back under the lectern, forgetting she even saw it, and getting on with her day.

But this sort of thing was her job for the day, so, with a resigned sigh, Lucy picked up the book and flipped it open.

Each page bore at its top the name of a different restaurant in town, followed by messy, handwritten notes. Lucy’s head spun. This was Chester White’s review notebook. She started to read a random entry.

Opus. 22 Feb (Sat).

Venue style overwrought French elegance but good space in general.

Amuse bouche: scallop/apple/celeriac/aged prosciutto. Strong start. Chef racked his brain for ideas to impress CW probably. Bit of a hack, as suspected.

Lucy skimmed through a concise, if at times severe, evaluation of the meal Chester had sampled. Then, at the end:

Service slow - even for CW!? Maître de basically an imbecile, ugly as an old pumpkin.

Waitress (Gabby? Abby? Doesn’t matter) a very nice little piece. Great ass, cute little mouth. Bet she goes off in the sack. Would come back for another look at that.

Donation $9k generous enough. Score 15.5, 16?

Lucy stared at the final lines in shock. She read them again. She flipped clumsily to a new page.

Lune de Mer. 14 May. Thurs.

Her eyes flew over the menu description to the concluding comments:

Waitress needs a treadmill/one of chef’s insipid side salads. I wouldn’t say no to a BJ if it were on the cards tho.

Donation $5k. Poxy, cheap bastards. Score 12 at most. Shame; food/service was decent.

Lucy fell backwards to sit on the carpet, heart racing, head swimming. Each entry followed the same formula: sexist commentary (or homophobic, but apparently most venues knew to send Chester a female server) and a record of each venue’s “donation”.

Chester White, the country’s star food and venue critic, was taking bribes.

****

Chester White, the country’s star food and venue critic, was waiting for his car. He didn’t personally drive these days, thanks to an unfortunate incident involving a bottle of Macallan 15, a Mercedes S-Class, and a street sign that now has a decided incline. But you don’t spend 38 years at the top of the industry to stand on the street ordering a rideshare like a peasant, so Chester always insisted that any event or venue he attended arranged a private car service in each direction. He chuckled, thinking about the time he’d redirected his homeward ride to the peninsula wine region, a 90-minute trip. Must have cost Circulo at least a grand, on top of whatever else they had palmed him. Fuckwits.

He shifted his substantial mass on the lobby sofa and watched a petite concierge staff member stroll across the gleaming tiled floor. Catching his gaze, she smiled gave an easy smile. She knew who he was, of course, but as a front-of-house attendee at the Plaza, she was not particularly dazzled by fame. Fortune, perhaps, Chester mused, noting her understated diamond necklace-earring ensemble, glimmering under the light of the chandelier. This one could probably be won over by throwing around a bit of cash, he smirked to himself.

‘Mister White?’ a voice off to his side lured Chester out of the adult film that had started to reel in his mind. He turned, unhurried, toward the voice’s owner. It was a young woman, dressed in neat chef’s whites including cap and necktie. Chester’s half-hearted erection hesitated, trying to decide whether she was worth sticking around for. Probably not, it concluded, and slumped back to sleep.

Chester waved a dismissive paw at the girl. ‘No autographs today,’ he snapped. She didn’t dissolve into thin air, like he had expected. He glared at the space she continued to occupy.

‘Mister White, I am not here for an autograph,’ Lucy was surprised at how confident she sounded. ‘I… have something I think you may want.’

He lifted an eyebrow in her direction. Fuck it – he’d consider it, if she was dumb enough to think she could screw her way up the ladder. ‘I’m listening,’ he said.

‘Rather, I should say, I have something I think may belong to you.’ Lucy pulled the little black notebook from her back pocket.

Chester White’s flabby face blanched. He leaped to his feet, immediately beginning to sweat in his custom-made three-piece. His hand flew to his inside-breast pocket, finding it empty.

‘Where did you get that?’ he hissed.

Lucy drummed her fingers against the notebook’s cover, holding his gaze with a boldness that belied her inner panic. ‘Found it,’ she said airily. ‘I would have thought one would be more careful with something so… valuable.’

Chester took a step toward her. ‘Now you listen here, you little bitch – ’

‘Mister White.’ Lucy did not flinch. ‘There’s certainly no cause to make a scene in front of –’ she gestured around the lavish space, which was now beginning to fill with guests, chefs and industry icons, ‘– all these people.’

Chester froze, then sat hurriedly once more on the sofa, motioning impatiently for Lucy to sit opposite him. She complied, facing him squarely, holding the little book flat on her knees. She realised she was enjoying witnessing the crumbling of his usually dignified demeanour. He couldn’t seem to take his eyes off the book. She ran her thumbs in small, slow circles over its smooth, matte cover.

The critic snapped out of his stupor. He looked Lucy in the eye. ‘What do you want?’ his fury was palpable. Lucy allowed herself a small smile.

‘I was so eager to catch you before you left, Mr White, I didn’t have time to add up all the… figures in this little register,’ she began. ‘It looks like about 18 months’ worth, though, and you’ve been in the business how many years…?’

The lobby was busier now, a flurry of guests and presenters emerging from the day’s final session to cash in their complimentary drink tickets. Famed restaurateur Horace Glicke emerge from the fray and strode toward them, smiling eagerly. Chester shooed him away impatiently. Horace stopped, stood awkwardly for a moment, then spun on his heel and walked to the bar. Lucy watched as he slid onto a barstool next to – oh! – Lorna Nix. Lorna was busy ignoring a cluster of journalist, and coolly signing copies of her bestselling book for starry-eyed fans.

Satisfied that they would remain alone, Chester glared at Lucy. ‘How. Much.’ he snarled through clenched teeth.

But Lucy was staring at Lorna Nix. She turned back to Chester and held up the notebook. ‘She’s not in it,’ Lucy said.

‘What?’

‘Lorna Nix. Femme fatale of fine dining.’ Lucy pointed the book toward the bar. ‘Her restaurant is not in your seedy little scribblings. Why not?’

Dumbfounded, Chester looked over at Lorna, sitting serenely amid the hustle of the bar. ‘Lorna… plays her own game. Not mine.’ he admitted spitefully. He turned again to meet Lucy’s gaze. ‘Ten thousand,’ he tabled the offer coldly. Lucy smiled, broadly this time.

‘I would have thought you’d be a little more eager to keep this between us?’ Watching this pig sweat was so much more satisfying than she had anticipated. ‘Twenty.’ Her tone did not invite further negotiation.

With no hint of hesitation, Chester nodded keenly, pulling his chequebook from his attaché. ‘Fine. Done. Now give me my fucking book.’ He reached toward her. She pulled back.

‘…There’s one more thing.’ Chester’s face collapsed in despair.

‘What is it. Any fucking thing. Just tell me. Make this go away,’ he pleaded. She had him like a fish, thrashing on the end of a hook, eyeing a painful end. She stared him down.

‘I want a job in Lorna Nix’s kitchen.’

Silence fell between the sparing pair. The country’s star food and venue critic faltered, eyes darting about.

‘I… that’s a… I don’t know that I can do that,’ he said. ‘Lorna is… extremely selective about who she will meet…’

‘I fucking know that,’ Lucy interrupted. ‘That’s why I need you to get me an in.’ She held the book upright. ‘Make it happen, Chester.’

As though in a trance, Chester rose, and walked slowly toward the bar. The people he passed side-eyed him and gave him a wide berth: it was as plain as day that he was not in any mood for smalltalk. Lucy watched as he sidled up to Lorna, who took a deliberately long moment to acknowledge his presence. The two conversed for a moment, as Lucy fiddled anxiously with the cheque. Lorna’s demeanour was as regal, as always, while Chester’s mannerisms had become frenetic. Neither the chef nor the critic looked toward Lucy. She wondered what was being said. Finally, smiling like a cat, Lorna handed Chester a business card, and with that, she rose from her barstool and disappeared into the crowd.

Returning to the sofa, Chester brusquely handed Lucy the card, which bore Lorna’s handwritten invitation to meet. Lucy gazed at it for a long moment, while Chester, in turn, stared at her. ‘Well?’

Lucy stood to face the media behemoth, feeling herself matched despite the significant disparity in their sizes. With an arch turn of the wrist, she held the notebook out to Chester, who snatched it from her greedily. Lucy spun on her heel, as Chester collapsed onto the sofa, clutching his precious notebook. He looked up at her departing figure.

‘Bribery. Extortion. Blackmail. You’re no better than me.’

Lucy stopped, turning to face her defeated opponent. Inside her pocket, she ran a finger along the edge of the papers, perforated slightly from where she had gently prised them from the threaded bindings of the notebook.

‘Who says I want to be better than you?’